Heretofore, a structure has been known (for example, see Patent Reference 1) that, in a vehicular hood structure for protecting a collision member when the collision member collides against the hood, reinforces a central region portion (which hereinafter may be referred to as a hood general portion) excluding outer peripheral end portions of the hood. In order to plastically deform a hood inner panel with a reasonable load at a time of collision, a plural number of wave-like beads are formed at the hood inner panel and a reinforcement plate is disposed between a hood outer panel and the hood inner panel, or the like. A further structure is known (for example, see Patent Reference 2) that, in a vehicular hood structure, deforms a hood lock reinforce with a bending portion as a starting point when a load of a predetermined value or greater is inputted. The bending portion is provided at the hood lock reinforce that is provided between a hood inner panel and a hood outer panel, in order to reasonably suppress a load reaction that is inputted to a collision member when the collision member collides against a hood front end portion side, which is a hood front side of a hood general portion.
Now, with a structure in which these structures are included in combination to serve as a pedestrian protection measure, if a collision member collides against, for example, a vicinity of an intermediate position between the hood general portion and a portion close to a hood front end edge (a portion that includes a portion substantially directly above a hood lock portion), two loads are caused to act—a load that deforms the hood inner panel of the hood general portion and a load that deforms the hood lock reinforce of the hood front end portion—and there is a risk of a load reaction to be inputted to the collision member being increased.
Patent Reference 1: Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open (JP-A) No. 2004-58973
Patent Reference 2: JP-A No. 2004-50909